White South African friends... i have so much love for you. A number of you, when race conversations have been happening, have asked the question, "What can i do?" and as one who doesn't have all the answers but certainly has some of the journey, i figured I can share some things that helped me to move further along in this conversation. So for the next forty days, i am hoping to share an idea [...]
Walking through the airport on the way to Durban, i spotted Russel Brand's new book 'Recovery - Freedom from our Addictions' in Exclusive Books. And promptly bought it to read on the plane and beyond. i am a HUGE Russel Brand fan. i think he is highly underrated and that a lot of his wisdom is often missed or dismissed due to his incredible in-your-face persona which many find jarring. But from his comedy to [...]
i have a friend called Wayne Eaves. i'm a big fan. Wayne has been an incredible encouragement, in particular, this last year as he manages to get the timing perfectly right to send me an irreverent cartoon or a hilarious video clip or challenging article about life and faith and the world. He nails it pretty much every time and he knows just where to push the buttons. Most importantly Wayne keeps it real. i [...]
When i say "Cape Flats", you say "Violence!" "Cape Flats!" "VIOLENCE!!" "Cape Flats!" "VIOLENCE!!" Because, along with Nazareth and townships and maybe even Africa as a whole, that is the kind of mindset that too many of us hold, right? The mindset that says [or suggests, or at the very least thinks]: What good ever came out of the Cape Flats...? Time to flip this narrative This past weekend i had the privilege - and [...]
This past week i was contacted by a Facebook friend who told me he had been following me since my Truth mag days [an amazing magazine i used to write for]. Which was a long, long time ago in a galaxy much like ours. Him and his wife have been out of the country for three years [dejavu] and have returned and are living in Cape Town and trying to educate themselves around topics of [...]
About a week ago i was hanging out with a group of friends discussing some quite incredible stories of generosity that we had all been involved in this past year. Each person in the group was connected to a person in the story of generosity although the majority of the group didn't know the people involved. The stories ranged from educational assistance to helping start up a township business to paying for a vehicle to [...]
Who are your 'my people'? i was watching a typical exchange about some race issue on the book of face-offs yesterday when something struck me... The man commenting - who happened to be an afrikaner - said something about "my people" - and the light bulb went on and started pulsating to a disco beat. There is a very real problem for me when your "my people" all look the same or speak the same language [...]
After asking for a selection of recommended books to read about or by South Africans, my sister-in-law asked me if i could do the same thing for children. Which i did. And wow, did you all respond... i'm not sure all of these fit into the South African/African ask but a lot of them do and this just seems to be a list of super amazing books for young ones: Megan Furniss: Good Night Stories [...]
Looking for great South African [and African] books to read? My friend Shelley Finch tagged me in this status on Facebook the other day: Friends, I am crowdsourcing a book list. Kind of a "recommended reading for every South African". Fiction and non-fiction. Books that will help people educate themselves on our country's history and the BIG issues we are talking about i.e. racism, corruption, land redistribution, etc. Books that are accessible to every South [...]
Do you want to be a better person than you are right now? i do, and that's the assumption that i start this post with. It boggles my mind that there seem to be people out there who don't want to be better people than they are now, but the evidence seems quite overwhelming to that regard. If it is true of anyone, this is not going to be helpful to them. But for the [...]
